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Hydraulic fracturing – fracking – is a process that can be used to extract natural gas from rock (shale) underground. In this process water, sand and chemicals are injected into the ground to crack the rocks containing the natural gas.

A recent YouTube video discusses some of the major arguments for and against the use of hydraulic fracturing in a – shall we say – less conventional format. This rap, titled “My Water’s on Fire Tonight,” attempts to bring attention to the current debate on the risks v. rewards of using this process in the United States. Drawing from concerns also raised in a National Academy of Science paper released last month, this video emphasizes the dangers from increased potential of methane gas leaks with hydraulic fracturing.

“My Water’s on Fire Tonight” lyrics:

Fracking is a form of natural gas drilling
An alternative to oil cause the oil kept spilling
Bringing jobs to small towns so everybody’s willing
People turn on their lights and the drillers make a killing

Water goes into the pipe, the pipe into the ground
The pressure creates fissures 7,000 feet down
The cracks release the gas that powers your town
That well is fracked….. Yeah totally fracked

But there’s more in the water than just H2O
Toxic chemicals help to make the fluid flow
With names like benzene and formaldehyde
You better keep ‘em far away from the water supply

The drillers say the fissures are a mile below
The groundwater pumped into American homes
But don’t tell it to the residents of Sublette Wy-O
That water’s fracked…. We’re talking Benzene…

What the frack is going on with all this fracking going on
I think we need some facts to come to light
I know we want our energy but nothing ever comes for free
I think my water’s on fire tonight

So it all goes back to 2005
Bush said gas drillers didn’t have to comply
with the Safe Drinking Water Act, before too long
It was “frack, baby, frack” until the break of dawn.

With the EPA out it was up to the states
But they didn’t have the money to investigate
Sick people couldn’t prove fracking was to blame
All the while water wells were going up in flames

Cause it’s hard to contain all the methane released
It can get into the air, it can get into the streams.
It’s a greenhouse gas, worse than CO2
Fracking done wrong could lead to climate change too

Now it’s not that drillers should never be fracking
But the current regulation is severely lacking
Reduce the toxins, contain the gas and wastewater
And the people won’t get sick and the planet won’t get hotter

What the frack is going on with all this fracking going on
I think we need some facts to come to light
I know we want our energy but nothing ever comes for free
I think my water’s on fire tonight